Connect

Real Impact

I am a builder, a maker, a founder, a creator. I’m your consummate blue-sky thinker and big idea connector. A relentlessly logical thinker who has the unusual and happy counter of a right-brain-leaning, creative mind. It’s how I’m wired.

This translates to a long line of “firsts” where I created something when before there was nothing. Sometimes I achieved these on my own, sometimes as a member of a team. Often I am the one creating a strategic plan, inspiring and galvanizing our team toward a common goal.

My ideas can be boundary pushing and ambitious, but they are always accompanied by pragmatic plans for “doing.” Because what makes big-picture opportunities so exciting is precisely their attainability. To that end, I learned early the importance of results, of doing what needs to be done when it needs to be done. I put myself through university and graduate school and became an early master of maximizing value with the most scant resources.

Dreams are nice and goal setting is good, but results matter most.

And results are what I deliver. The most recent example is PhDs at Work, a professional network for PhDs working outside academia and those who aspire to join them. I founded the organization with little more than passion, vision, and time. I’ve established key strategic partnerships, regularly hold networking events in cities across the U.S., lead in-person workshops, and recruit guest bloggers to complement the network’s online activity. The site has received major press mentions and is experiencing exponential growth.

Before that, I redesigned research and innovation processes for the global operations and technology organization at Citi to create the Research Center of Excellence. And prior to that I created Citi’s first-ever Sustainable IT program, harnessing work by disparate teams into a cohesive whole and leveraging the resulting new data and dollar saves to go after even larger, more ambitious goals. Both programs resulted in millions of dollars in saves and consistent praise by firm leadership and industry press.

I joined Citi after working several years as an independent consultant. During that time I spent a year working in experiential marketing at a large media and entertainment group for which I produced a million-dollar interactive public exhibit and shareholder event. (As an aside, shipping half a million dollars worth of pop-culture memorabilia cross-country was far more complicated than I would have ever imagined.) The majority of my clients, however, were in the NGO and non-profit sectors. There my work circled around stakeholder engagement and donor cultivation strategies, an off-shoot of a winning track record I had developed in grant writing.

It’s all an interconnected path that stemmed from my original career as an academic expert in the transmission and reception of key messages based on sociopolitical context and technological form: content marketing for a digital age.

As a researcher, I conducted field research in eight countries on three continents. I spent hours digging through national archives, conducting site visits, and interviewing makers, influencers, and witnesses. I also regularly spoke at conferences in both Europe and the United States. As a university educator, I spent five years designing and delivering university courses and training adult learners. Academia was the training ground where I mastered the skills of critical thinking, exceptional writing, and the always-terrifying art of unbending self-discipline.

Technology has remained a primary focus throughout my career, and these days I’m most interested in the wide spectrum of emerging technologies and ways they can be leveraged to deliver high-impact solutions. I believe perspectives culled from a wide variety of sources – sources that may at first seem unrelated – inform the best results. It’s an approach I exemplify in my thinking and professional trajectory, and it’s the same creative and rigorous energy I bring when working with you and your team.

My sweet spot is at the intersection of business strategy, technology, and innovation – unique expertise that I leverage to help you drive change and exceed expectations, including your own.